


Pretty Lies (Ugly Truth)

by librathecancer



Category: Fire Emblem: Kakusei | Fire Emblem: Awakening
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Fluff, M/M, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-22
Updated: 2019-09-11
Packaged: 2020-05-16 12:19:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,749
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19318039
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/librathecancer/pseuds/librathecancer
Summary: Libra and Lon’qu have been inseparable since freshman year, and nothing could change the trusting friendship they’d built.Except for maybe a lifelong phobia, a little white lie, and a family meeting for which Lon’qu desperately needs a ‘date’.





	1. Prologue

“Absolutely not.”  
“Just hear me out-“  
“I have. Twice. And my answer has not changed. Actually, now it’s an even more resounding ‘no’ than before.”  
Libra watches as Lon’qu’s gaze drops to his flat white, and he can practically see the poor man’s _heart_ dropping, too. It makes him feel uncomfortable and more than a little guilty, so he takes a deep breath and retries.  
“Forgive me for being short, Lon’qu. But I just couldn’t stand to... to lie to your parents.” The skeptical look he gets tells him the fib sounds as obvious as it feels. “...Or to be introduced to them as a woman. Or your _girlfriend_.”  
“R-right... of course, but.. I mean, I told them I was over my fear, not just that I have a girlfriend. I can’t bring in an actual woman or they’ll know I’m lying straight away...”  
“I trust you know how much my appearance affects me, Lon’qu?” Libra knows he does. It’s the only thing in their 2-year-old friendship that Lon’qu has ever seen him get truly upset about (something that still somehow seems to shock Lon’qu to no end: the concept of an angry Libra), and a topic that Libra has frequently watched Lon’qu tiptoe around, presumably in order to avoid the unnecessarily uncomfortable conversation that he surely knows would follow. (And now, the very same man sits before him over a cup of room-temperature coffee, asking that he pose as his girlfriend for the petty cause of upholding a lie. How convenient it seems!)  
Somewhere in his irritation, Libra misses the shift, but the next time he looks at Lon’qu he sees the expression he hates most: that of a child who’s just put on his favorite show for his mother and been told it wasn’t any good. The look of crushed hope, of ice cream on concrete. And all in a moment his frustration unravels like a poorly knit sweater, and he suddenly finds himself thinking how it couldn’t be _too_ bad for a couple of strangers to take him for a woman. What’s two more straws on the camel’s back, right?  
Before Lon’qu can apologize, Libra cuts in again, sitting up a little straighter now. “I’ll reconsider if you give me a good reason to.” And Libra watches the hope start trickling back into those obsidian eyes before it all spills back in at once, and he watches Lon’qu’s eyebrows lift and his eyes widen and his hair fall into his face, and he watches his mouth start to move, quickly, in the shape of sounds and of letters and of words, and he doesn’t register a single word aside from perhaps the first and the last, but it turns out that’s reason enough for him. Libra hums as though he’s thinking over (what were probably, in actuality, very poorly crafted) arguments, trying to look cool and unaffected despite the twitch of his brow and the flaming red in his cheeks, before he sits back again and takes a long, fake-contemplative sip of his cold coffee.  
“...Well, when are we going?”


	2. Only Us

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lon'qu's face is suddenly unreadable, eyes calculating as his free hand reaches out suddenly to brush Libra’s bangs out of his face. It's unexpected, though he sees it coming, and he barely suppresses a shudder as the hand swivels smoothly back around to cup his cheek. Lon’qu’s hands are calloused as ever, and Libra thinks quietly that he can feel some of the tissue healing over.

“It’s a little, uh. Formal.”

Libra’s hopeful expression falters as he looks down at the black slacks and sleek button-up he’d chosen to model. He eyes himself in the mirror, turning to see himself from different angles.

“I don’t see the issue. Better overdressed than under, yes?” Surely it’d only give the impression that he was a progressive, smart young woman, perhaps with some sort of respectable office job. She didn’t seem like the sort of person to chase a degree in something like, say, theology, after all- surely she’d have enough sense in her not to take up a path which would never help her unless she were to become a religious leader. No, she’d be much more sensible than that, and surely a whole lot more self-interested, too.  
Libra gets a little too lost in her characterization, and is almost surprised when Lon’qu next speaks.

“Y-you, um... well, it’s really just- not that you look bad or anything, but...” Lon’qu exhales, sits back on his sofa. “You just really look like a man, Libra.”

He could almost laugh at the irony. It was not often he got to hear those words spoken to him, so of course it’d only be under these circumstances when he did.  
Then again, the gods have always been particularly cruel to Libra.

“...Alright. I’ll change,” he agrees, and steps back into the bathroom.

 

~~~

 

Four outfits and an eternity later, Libra stares himself down in the bathroom mirror. It’s a casual look this time, just some skinny jeans and a tucked shirt under a knitted cardigan, but the sight makes his skin crawl. He looks so intentionally womanly, it’s foreign; so often he attempts to downplay his outward femininity that doing the exact opposite- dressing to accentuate it- is definitely a strange sensation.  
He does look very much like a woman, though, and that’s all that was asked of him. He would hate to disappoint.  
He hesitates to open the door, unable to keep the nervous edge from his motion as he pushes it shut behind him and shuffles into the room. He watches as Lon’qu meets his eye, then searches him up and down in a way that sends a shiver down Libra’s spine _(no, not that, not now, stop thinking)_. His eyes drop to the ground.

“I-I.. um,” Libra starts, and clears his throat to try again. “I don’t know if.. if it’s quite-”

“It’s perfect,” Lon’qu cuts in _very_ quickly, a fact which Libra wouldn’t have even noticed if the ever-tactless boy hadn’t stiffened like he’d just produced damning evidence in a matter much more important than this. (It’s important to Libra, though, more important than anything, and he scolds himself for feeling hopeful that Lon’qu’s eagerness could mean anything at all.) “I... mean. It’s good. You look. Good. In a girl way, but- also, you know, not.” Libra did not know, but he nodded as though he did.

“Right. Okay.” He carefully sits beside Lon’qu, feeling a sudden awkwardness thicken the air between them. “Well, ah.. they’re expecting us when?”

Lon’qu fumbles to open his phone, scrolling up through a text thread with his parents until the frantic tapping slows to a halt. “Uhh.... 6:30.”

Libra checks the time on his flip phone. It reads 5:48; his phone is always ahead by 2. “We’ve got time to kill, then, yes?” He sees Lon’qu nod, watches his mess of hair shift out of place, and his breath catches in his throat as he fights down thoughts of _fix it, play with it, kiss his cheek, hold his hand._  
Another equally unwelcome thought hits him out of nowhere, and he almost feels more guilty about it than about the original ideas themselves. And yet... it would give him the opportunity to have what he wanted, just this once, and have his dear friend be none the wiser. It was not a good idea by any means, and one of a definite moral grey area, but he couldn’t help being hopeful that it could work and bring him joy and a fairytale ending.

“Do you think we might should practice?”

The words are out of his mouth before he can start building up the infinite courage he’d have needed to _think_ about such an awful idea, and he can hardly hear Lon’qu over his heart suddenly racing in his ears:

“...Huh?”

Libra tries to regain his calm, looking back over at his friend with a (hopefully) casual shrug. “Well, I don’t know. Don’t you think we should feel it out?” He cringes (blushes) at his own word choice, and shakes his head quickly. “Not.. well.. I don’t know. We just.. probably should go in seeming like we’re actually dating, right? So some practice could go a long way.”

To his surprise, Lon’qu actually considers it. Even more surprising, he _nods,_ though fails to meet Libra’s eyes. “No, yeah, I mean. We definitely.. should. It’s like, uh- like.. you know what method acting is?” He does not. “Well, it’s when you act like your role outside of the show, I guess, so you’re kind of.. learning more about the.. the character. Or whatever. So.. we could do that with this. S-so that we know what we’re doing, I mean.”

Libra can’t believe his ears.

“...That sounds perfect,” he says, and it _does._ “So then, should we-”

He’s cut off when Lon’qu gently sets his hand on top of Libra’s own, and his skin tingles and prickles and his heart does a little flip in his chest. “Is that okay?” Lon’qu says, gone from avoiding all eye contact to staring intensely straight into Libra’s eyes. “I mean, with your...”

“Yeah,” Libra manages, because it is so very okay. It’s sweet of him to ask, but Libra’s chronic touch aversion has had only one exception in years, and he has no qualms with the sensation of that exception’s hand in his.

“Okay.” Lon’qu nods. “Good.” His face is suddenly unreadable, eyes calculating as his free hand reaches up suddenly to brush Libra’s bangs out of his face. It's still unexpected though he sees it coming, and he barely suppresses a shudder as the hand swivels smoothly back around to cup his cheek. Lon’qu’s hands are calloused as ever, and Libra thinks quietly that he can feel some of the old damaged tissue healing over.  
Moments pass of a hand on his cheek, heart and stomach turning somersaults, enchanted by those cool obsidian eyes. He tries to think of a way to make it less personal, less intimate, to take back the control- to turn it back into two characters’ romance, rather than letting himself hope it might be his. (Hope has not gotten him far in life thus far, after all, and he doubts it will start now.)

He tries to think of something a girl might say in this situation, clearing his throat to distract himself. “Sh-should I.. do something with my hair? O-or, um- put on some makeup?”

Lon’qu looks strangely amused, his hand coming back up to run through Libra's hair.

“You don’t own any makeup,” he says with a chuckle, and it isn’t his acting voice, isn’t his character voice, isn’t rehearsed or practiced or even reminiscent of anyone else but _Lon’qu._ He’s just Lon’qu, and Libra is just Libra, and in the moment, their locked eyes reach an agreement: that they’re perfectly alright with that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> who wants to guess what lonlon's major is lol  
> please leave any feedback u have!! or say hi! i just want to know if anyone is reading or enjoying bc honestly hits and kudos don't tell you much @ all  
> starting to regret making this a modern au but there is not enough modern lonlibra content so i felt as though it was my personal duty to add to that tiny pile ^^


End file.
